Victoria's Dirty Secrets

It's a good thing developer Brainmelt thought to put the word 'dirty' in between Victoria's and Secrets. Without it, the title would only get confused with the chain of lingerie shops, and then girls would download it under the belief it was something to do with bras and knickers, while men would obviously still download it, albeit not as enthusiastically as with the full title.

The word 'dirty' puts any confusion to rest immediately – it does actually involve a porn element which is nothing to do (and we stress this in case its lawyers are reading) with the lingerie retailer or any of its models. Instead, it features Penthouse Pet Victoria. And friends.

Victoria's Dirty Secrets (three words that are difficult to begin an authoritative sentence with) is a game similar to the plastic puzzles you usually find in Christmas crackers, where you slide the pieces around to correctly put together a picture. Victoria's pictures, not surprisingly, aren't comprised of watercolours or cats – suffice it to say they probably aren't the sort of thing you want the person sitting on the bus behind to see you looking at, either.

Admirably, and pointlessly, the developer has thought up a plot as to why you're slotting together photos of a girl in nothing more than a bra against a time limit. There's a bomb in each level, you see, and only discovering the passcode by piecing Victoria together before it blows will both diffuse it and rescue her. This explains the TNT ticking away at the bottom of the screen, counting down the seconds you still have to work out which end of the picture each bit of lace and flesh belongs.

Being quite simplistic, each picture is only divided into four sections to begin with, though the control system means this is tougher than it sounds. Each section is numbered from 1-4 and, starting from the top, you need to press the numbers in the order you think they need to go, creating a passcode.

While four is hard enough, the levels progress so the pictures are subsequently split into five parts, then six. Cue a lot of careful examination of body parts, followed by brain frazzling working out of what goes where against the strict clock. It's exhausting, not to mention disturbing when you get it wrong and end up looking at Victoria with a nipple for an eye.

There is a reward, however. Successfully piece together the picture and you get a sprinkling of fairy dust that magics away Victoria's underwear, leaving you with the mildly erotic, if slightly seedy, victory of looking at her minus bra or thong. Then it's on to the next mission to rescue the girl and, um, stare at her naked body.

You've got three lives in total – lose them all and you must start at the beginning again. If you were thinking – like us – that writing down the passcodes would make for quicker progress, think again, because every time you play the pieces are scattered randomly. It's just a shame the pictures aren't randomised as well.

Or that there aren't more of them. Completing the first level 'rewards' you with moving on to a more difficult level with exactly the same pictures in exactly the same order. Good as Victoria looks minus all of her clothes, seeing the same picture for the fifth time inevitably means some of the appeal is lost. By the time you're on your tenth attempt, the predictability of what comes next means you might as well be piecing together a photo of mouldy old fruit.

Each of the three levels contains four parts, plus a bonus round where the picture is split vertically instead of horizontally. The accompanying sound effects do the job – there's little more to them than the sound of exploding dynamite when you mess up, and a congratulatory few chords to accompany the erasing of the underwear. Then again, you can at least play it with the sound on without the fear of anyone within hearing distance working out exactly the sort of game you're playing.

But it's disappointing to find the gameplay involves nothing more than entering codes to slot together pictures against harsh time limits and with no room for error. Obviously, the nudity is really the point of the game as opposed to just being an added incentive, so it's a bit of a con to just get five or six of the same photos used again and again.

And that, it transpires, is Victoria's real dirty secret: a game with little content, little gameplay and little point paying for.